Many methods and processes are known to clean, purify, clarify and otherwise treat fluids for proper disposal, consumption, use, and other needs. These methods include, but are not necessarily limited to, centrifugation and filtration to remove particulates, chemical treatments to sterilize water, distillation to purify liquids, decanting to separate two phases of fluids, reverse osmosis to desalinate liquids, electrodialysis to desalinate liquids, pasteurization to sterilize food-stuffs, and catalytic processes to covert undesirable reactants into useful products. Each of these methods is well-suited for particular applications and typically a combination of methods is used for a final product.
More particularly, removing hydrocarbons and organic materials from fluids, particularly aqueous fluids, is a significant part of these purifying processes, particularly in the discipline of recovering hydrocarbons from subterranean formations. Such processes include, but are not necessarily limited to, settling tanks, electrostatic separators, cyclonic separation, demulsification using chemical demulsifiers and combinations of these. While many of these processes are commercially useful, there is often a need to remove hydrocarbons and organic materials to a very low level. It is typically difficult, for instance, to remove all of the organic material from water so that the water may be understood as pure, such as for consumption or re-use.
There is always a need to develop new apparatus and compositions that will remove as much as possible the amount of hydrocarbons and organic materials from aqueous fluids, even after such materials have been otherwise substantially removed from the fluids.